


here we are in the wrong tunnel

by sublimity



Category: Mr. Robot (TV)
Genre: F/F, Grief/Mourning, Not A Fix-It, Season/Series 04, darlene deals with the aftermath of angela's death, it's sad, the word "fuck" and its derivatives are used a lot because it's darlene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-11
Updated: 2020-01-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:35:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22212670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sublimity/pseuds/sublimity
Summary: The thing is, Angela wasn’t just Elliot’s best friend. She was Darlene’s, too.
Relationships: Darlene Alderson & Angela Moss, Darlene Alderson/Angela Moss
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	here we are in the wrong tunnel

**Author's Note:**

> i'm probably super late considering the show is over, but i've been reading a lot of richard siken's poetry lately, and it made me think of this ship. i'm a #1 domlene enthusiast, but i think we can all agree darlene had a thing for angela at some point, and i just had to get this out of my system, so please enjoy!
> 
> disclaimer: darlene's opinion that elliot doesn't care about the fact that angela died is not my own! we obviously know it's not true but she doesn't at that point in the show so she comes to her own (albeit incorrect) conclusions.

> And I can’t eat, can’t sleep, can’t sit still or fix things and I wake up and I wake up and you’re still dead,
> 
> — **Richard Siken** , from “Straw House, Straw Dog”

She walks down the street and every corner she turns, Darlene sees Angela. The same blonde hair, straightened and parted on one side the way she liked to wear it, her hourglass figure, pale complexion. She follows behind like a fucking _creep_ , entranced, and nearly reaches out to touch — except she doesn’t, in fear of dissipating the illusion. She doesn’t follow far enough to see the face when Angela’s ghost eventually turns. Darlene decides she doesn’t want to know. She’d rather not. She thinks she understands, deep down, they’re not her.

It doesn’t stop her, anyway.

Elliot thinks she’s tripping, or losing her mind, or both. Darlene thinks he doesn’t care enough.

She thinks — how can he even be okay right now? He’s just accepted Angela’s death like it was— like it was _whatever_ , and Darlene _hates_ him for it. Darlene hates him because she doesn’t understand. Elliot loved Angela. Now she’s gone.

 _You loved her, too,_ says the annoying little voice in Darlene’s head. _Shut the fuck up,_ she says back. She wants to scream. She wants to shut it out.

So that’s exactly what she attempts to do, getting shit-faced at a party and snorting whatever’s offered to her. Why are there people in Angela’s house? Why is she? Darlene can’t remember. Her head is spinning, her vision is hazy, and she can barely stand.

You see, Darlene’s lost her fair share of people in the twenty-four years of her life. She likes to think she can handle loss just fine. If you repress something hard enough, you can almost remain nonchalant, so her M.O. has always been bottling her feelings up and never talking about them with anyone. It’s Angela that finally breaks the dam.

The thing is, Angela wasn’t just Elliot’s best friend. She was Darlene’s, too.

So Darlene thinks of all the times they played together as kids, the three of them against the world. She thinks of kissing Angela at a high school party playing spin the bottle. She thinks of Angela’s sheepish smile and the burning in Darlene’s chest afterwards, something cloying and scary uncurling inside her, making its way like vines up her throat. She thinks of Angela kissing her cheek and giggling while Darlene’s heart skipped a beat. She thinks of the ballet classes they used to attend together and how easy it was back then. She thinks of the time the three of them fought, Angela claiming they’d been purposely leaving her out of things and Darlene thinking it was _bullshit_ , because she’d never do that to her, _how could she not get that_. She thinks of Angela brainwashed by Whiterose, her hair a tangled mess, mascara streaks on her face from crying. She thinks of holding Angela’s hand while she babbled about the victims of the cyber bombings coming back to life, remembers not knowing what to say to her, unsure of what to do. She thinks of—

Angela, dead.

There are people in Angela’s bedroom, and Darlene really doesn’t know how the _fuck_ they all got there, and she wants them _out now_, and she wants to scream because it’s _Angela’s_ _bedroom_ , and they shouldn’t be here, and they’re doing fucking _drugs_ in Angela’s bedroom, they’re touching Angela’s stuff like they’re fucking _allowed_ , and Darlene wants to scream, so she starts screaming at them to get the fuck out, and they look at her like she’s alien, and Darlene screams some more because _they don’t understand_. She wants to punch something or blow her fucking brains out — she’s not quite sure which one it is.

She picks up the ballet shoes and holds them close to her chest, lying down on the bed. She feels her throat tighten and cries so hard she feels like she’s going to throw up. Angela’s gone. She isn’t coming back. Angela’s _dead_ — and the world doesn’t stop moving, and life goes on, like it’s _nothing_. Darlene doesn’t get it, wishes she could get it — is mad at the universe for letting it happen and also at Elliot for being able to accept it so easily because she _can’t_.

There’s a party going on, and Darlene doesn’t fucking care, and it dies down eventually, and she still hasn’t moved, clutching the satin to her chest. She feels numb. She misses Angela. Her cheeks are sticky from the tears and her nose is stuffy, and it’s horrible, and she thinks that maybe she died, too, and maybe this is hell, so she pinches herself. It hurts. Darlene is almost disappointed.

When she sleeps, she dreams of the blonde girl from her memories smiling at her.


End file.
